Famous Asian Leaders

Brief Background of the organization

CapitaLand is one of Asia’s largest real estate companies. It’s headquarter is situated and listed in Singapore where it main core competencies is real estate and real estate fund management mainly focusing on Singapore and China industry. The company mainly consists of several types of estate business, which includes homes, offices, shopping malls, serviced residences and mixed developments. Using its core competency and strength to develop real estate products and service in the market to cater to the industry. Their mission is to build a world-class company with international presence that creates sustainable shareholder value, delivers quality products and services and attracts and develops quality human capital, in the spirit of our credo, ‘Building for People to Build People’.

As quoted from CapitaLand: CapitaDNA is the motivation behind everything we do – from our focus on customers to our commitment to sustainability. It encompasses our six core values that serve as a foundation for how we do business, how we treat our stakeholders and how we interact in the workplace. CapitaDNA is communicated throughout the Group, and are defined to employees as follows:

Core Values

1. Our people are our strength. We build people to build for people.

2. We are committed to the highest standards of integrity.

3. We have the courage to do what is right and the will to succeed.

4. We add value to what we do through innovation and continuous improvement.

5. We are fair and reasonable in all our actions and dealings with business partners, customers and colleagues.

6. We contribute to the well-being of the community.

History of org

CapitaLand is a Singapore based real estate Company formed on November 2000 as a result of merger of DBS land and Pidemco Land and it is one of Asia’s largest real estate companies. The company's core businesses are real estate development, hospitality and real estate financial services. The geographic focus of the business is Singapore and the mainland of China, but the company is also engaged in Australia, Europe and the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council. CapitaLand Limited is the parent company of The Ascott Limited.

CapitaLand CEO and president Mr. Liew Mun leong have been appointed on April 15, 2013 as Provost’s chair Professor (Practice) in both the National University of Singapore (NUS) Business School and the Faculty of Engineering. Besides teaching and researching activities, Mr. Liew also provide leadership and strategic advice to staff at both NUS Business School, as well as the Faculty of Engineering. A business leader who has had more than 42 years' experience in the region's construction and real estate development industry in both the public and private sectors, Mr. Liew will teach undergraduate and postgraduate classes on management and leadership at NUS Business School on a part-time and pro bono basis.

Mr Liew Mun Leong has spent 22 years in the public service developing Singapore's Changi Airport, military airports and establishments, and heading two science and technology statutory boards. He was the Registrar of the Professional Engineers Board, granting engineers' licenses to practice in Singapore and regulating engineering practices in Singapore. He has also served in international public institutions such as the Executive Board of International Organization for Standardization (ISO), for which he was later elected and served as its President for one term.

In the private sector, he has had more than 20 years of experience leading and directing public companies listed in Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong and Australia. In 2000, he was appointed as the founding President and CEO of CapitaLand Limited, a public-listed real estate company, which under his watch, has become the largest real estate group (by market capitalisation) in Southeast Asia, operating in over 20 countries with more than 12,000 staff. He currently also sits on the boards of Singapore Exchange, CapitaLand Hope Foundation (the philanthropic arm of CapitaLand), NUS Business School, Human Capital Leadership Institute, Centre for Liveable Cities, Chinese Development Assistance Council and the Singapore China Foundation.

President and CEO of CapitaLand Group, Mr. Liew Mun Leong, is respected locally and internationally for his strong corporate leadership. He was named Fortune Magazine's 25 Asia's Most Powerful Business People and Financial Asia's Best CEO in Singapore this year. His other corporate awards include the Asia's Best Executive of 2008 (Singapore) by Asia money and Outstanding CEO of the Year in 2006 and 2007 by The Business Times.

Leadership styles

Authentic Leader

CapitaLand was recently named as an Asian Sector Leader in the Global Real Estate Sustainability Benchmark (GRESB) Report 2012. Sector leaders are recognized for their outstanding performance among regional peers and their best practice sustainability performance illustrates the way forward for the real estate  industry. CapitaLand was recognized as a corporate sustainability leader and listed on the 2011 Global 100 Most Sustainable Corporations in the World by Corporate Knights and the Sustainability Yearbook 2012, and was one of three Singapore companies in the Dow Jones Sustainability Asia Pacific Index 2011. Mr. Liew (CEO of CapitaLand) said that: “We are committed to be a good corporate citizen and invite our stakeholders to work hand in hand with us to benefit the communities where we operate. Together we can build a sustainable company with a soul”. CapitaLand treat their employees as their best assets to be on the competitive edge and building people helps them to further be on the top of the industry. They have over 12,000 staff Group-wide and a diverse talent pool of close to 80 nationalities located in more than 20 countries. All the staff in the company worked together as a team to achieve a common goal. The employees are united by the company core values, guided by company’s corporate principles such as the principles of focus, balance and scale; financial discipline; looking after shareholders (both majority and minority) and being corruption free.

Empathy, People Oriented behaviour
CapitaLand has a strong culture and value each and every one of their employees. Not only that, the company show that they value the staff by their actions. They train and develop the staff and equip them with relevant skills that would help the company to be on the competitive edge through programs offered by their own CapitaLand Institute of Management and Business (CLIMB) school, Ascott Centre for Excellence (ACE) and Innovation, Creativity, Entrepreneurship (ICE) initiatives. CapitaLand makes sure that every single one of their employees benefits from it, understand and master the skills correctly therefore, the average training hours are close to 60 hours per staff. He emphasis more on the quality that is going to be deliver to the world more than the quantity of people needed to work.

Not all company train their employees for a long duration of time as there are disadvantages when they send their staff for training. One of the main disadvantage that hospitality industry is the lack of employees which results in many company refuses to send their staff for long hours of training. These companies fail to understand that if they want a low turnover and a strong culture of the organization, it is important to develop their employees. It is the quality that is important and not the quantity that they should be focusing on. CapitaLand stands out from the rest of the industry where they focus on the taking care of the welfare of their employees.

Mr. Liew has a people-oriented leadership behavior and is an example of an authentic leader where his passion is to serve others through his leadership. He loves to make a difference than to be in a powerful, rich and prestige leader. Besides, he actually leads and let others learn the purpose and meaning when they are working for him. He treats everyone fairly and makes training essential for all his employees where the organization “schools” are build specially for their employees only whereas most of his competitors only sent their employees to courses or provide subsidies for the training for the employees. Mr. Liew had manage and taken care of his employees well being. Although CapitaLand is a huge organization but the management make the effort to formalize mandatory learning for all of its employees. He is definitely an example of a good leader in this hospitality industry as he process warmth in personal relationship, caring for his employees wellbeing and at the same time, emphasis on his vision to help the organization and the employees to grow, creativity and foresight to develop the organization to many different types of real estate business. Mr. Liew also motivate and influence the employees to work hard and share the credit that need to be shared. He also focuses on teamwork and teambuilding skills to allow the whole organization to collaborate and work together as one.

How did his/her leadership style applied to the hospitality industry?

Mr. Liew understands that he did not build the success himself, it also depends on the performances influences on others and he shares his awards and the recognition that he gains with his employees in public as he was conferred the prestigious Meritorious Service Medal (MSM) in Singapore's National Day Awards for his contribution to Changi Airport Group (CAG) as Chairman. MSM is the second highest accolade of the National Day Awards, which are given out annually to recognize those who have made outstanding contributions in public service or community work in Singapore. There were only five MSMs that were given out in this year's National Day Awards. Guided by these 3Ps, Mr. Liew's strong leadership has indeed laid the foundation for high growth, not only in Singapore's air transport and tourism industry but also for the CapitaLand Group. The mission of the CapitaLand is committed to their vision that is to emphasis not only to build buildings but also building people too. Mr. Liew embrace change and welcome all the changes that is available in the industry and he strike to make the company become better and better. It is with this mindset, guided by the credo, mission, and vision and core values, that they conduct our business, interact with stakeholders and contribute to the wellbeing of their employees and the community in a responsible and ethical way.

References

http://www.capitaland.com/about-capitaland

http://www.4-traders.com/CAPITALAND-6491122/news/Capitaland-CL-CapitaLand-recognised-as-global-sustainability-leader-by-Dow-Jones-Sustainability-I-15196726/

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/former-capitaland-ceo/665914.html

http://www.capitalandinside.com/profile/leaders/897-a-true-leader-and-public-service-veteran

http://www.capitaland.com/csr/sustainabilityreport/2011/president-ceo-message.html

http://thinkbusiness.nus.edu/articles/item/21-the-capitaland-approach-to-management

http://www.capitaland.com/our-people/leadership-learning/climb

Labels: CapitaLand, Liew Mun Leong